world wide web and its components and the related aspects

1. World Wide Web
&
Web Browsers

2. World Wide Web
The World Wide Web is abbreviated as WWW and is
commonly known as the web. The WWW was initiated by
CERN (European Council for Nuclear Research) in 1989.
WWW can be defined as the collection of different websites
around the world, containing different information shared via
local servers (or computers).
These websites contain text pages, digital images, audios,
videos, etc.

3. Users can access the content of these sites from any part of
the world over the internet using their devices such as
computers, laptops, cell phones, etc.
The WWW, along with internet, enables the retrieval and
display of text and media to your device.
A web page is given an online address called a Uniform
Resource Locator (URL). Collection of web pages that
belong to a specific URL is called a website,
e.g., www.facebook.com, www.google.com, etc. So, the Web
is like a huge electronic book whose pages are stored on
multiple servers across the world.

4. Small websites store all of their Web Pages on a single server,
but big websites or organizations place their Web Pages on
different servers in different countries so that when users of a
country search their site they could get the information quickly
from the nearest server.
Web provides a communication platform for users to retrieve
and exchange information over the internet. Unlike a book,
where we move from one page to another in a sequence, on
Web we follow hypertext links to visit a web page and from
that web page to move to other web pages. In order to access
the Web, a browser is needed to be installed on system.

5. History of the World Wide Web
It is a project created, by Tim Berner’s Lee in 1989, for
researchers to work together effectively at CERN.
CERN (European Council for Nuclear Research) is an
organization, later named as the World Wide Web
Consortium (W3C), which developed the web.
This organization is directed by Tim Berner’s Lee, the father
of the web.

6. Working of the World Wide Web
 The working of the World Wide Web is based on the client-server model.
 The client is the user machine, requesting documents from a server.
 A web server is a software system that guides web pages users request. Web
servers hold all the websites.
 When requested by the users (client), the servers transfer web pages or
information to the network computers of users.
 The browser built on the user’s computer permits users to access their found
documents.
 Much like someone lives on rent in a home, a website takes up and stays
stored on a computer.
 The site owner pays the hosting price for the same domain and hosts the server
while the user requests their web pages.
 The WWW starts working when you open your browser and enter a URL in the
address bar or check Google.

8. Web Browser
A software application used to access
information on the World Wide Web is called a
Web Browser.
When a user requests some information, the
web browser fetches the data from a web
server and then displays the webpage on the
user’s screen.

9. History of Web Browser
 “World Wide Web” was the first web browser created by Tim Berners Lee in 1990. This
is completely different from the World Wide Web that we use today
 In 1993, the “Mosaic” web browser was released. It had the feature of adding images
and an innovative graphical interface. It was the “the world’s first popular browser”
 After this, in 1994, Marc Andreessen started working on a new web browser, which was
released and was named “Netscape Navigator”
 In 1995, “Internet Explorer” was launched by Microsoft. It soon overtook as the most
popular web browser
 In 2002, “Mozilla Firefox” was introduced which was equally as competent as Internet
Explorer
 Apple too launched a web browser in the year 2003 and named it “Safari”. This browser
is commonly used in Apple devices only and not popular with other devices
 Finally, in the year 2008, Google released “Chrome” and within a time span of 3 years it
took over all the other existing browsers and is one of the most commonly used web
browsers across the world

10. Functions of Web Browser
 The main function is to retrieve information from the World Wide Web and
making it available for users
 Visiting any website can be done using a web browser. When a URL is
entered in a browser, the web server takes us to that website
 It makes Internet surfing easy as once we reach a website we can check
the hyperlinks and get more and more useful data online
 Browsers uses internal cache which gets stored and the user can open
the same webpage time and again without losing extra data
 Multiple webpages can be opened at the same time on a web browser
 Options like back, forward, reload, stop reload, home, etc. are available
on these web browsers, which make using them easy and convenient.

11. Types of Web Browser
1. World Wide Web
 The first web browser ever, launched in 1990
 Later named “Nexus” to avoid confusion with World Wide Web
 Had basic features and less interactive in terms of graphical interface
2. Mosaic
 It was the second web browser launched in 1993
 Had a better graphical interface. Images, text and graphics
 The team which was responsible for creating Mosaic was lead by Marc
Andreessen. It was named “the world’s first popular browser”

12. 3. Netscape Navigator
It was released in 1994 and became the dominant browser in
terms of usage
More versions of this browser were launched by Netscape
It had allowed free usage for non-commercial purposes
4. Internet Explorer
It was launched in 1995 by Microsoft
By 2003, it has attained almost 95% of usage and had become the
most popular browsers of all
It was included in the Microsoft Windows operating system
In 2015, it was replaced with “Microsoft Edge”, as it became the
default browser on Windows 10

13. 5. Firefox
It was introduced in 2002 and was developed by Mozilla and
became the dominant browser during 2003-04
This browser was also made available for mobile phones, tablets,
etc.
6. Google Chrome
It was launched in 2008 by Google. Multiple features from old
browsers were amalgamated to form better features
To save computers from malware, Google developed the ad-
blocking feature to keep the user data safe and secure
Incognito mode is provided where private searching is available
where no cookies or history is saved. Till date, it has the best user
interface

14. Search Engine V/s Web Browser
Benchmark Search engine Web browser
What is it?
A type of website that users can
use in order to search for the
information they require.
A software that allows users to
view the required information from
web pages or HTML files present
on the web servers.
Does it have its own database? Yes No
Is installation required? No Yes
Is it independent?
No. It is dependent on a web
browser.
Yes.
Components
It uses Graphical Interface to help
users experience an interactive
online session on the WWW
(World Wide Web).
It has three components, such as
search index, crawler, and search
algorithm.
Example Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. Chrome, Firefox, Opera, etc.

15. Search Engine
A search engine is a software that brings to user relevant
information(which they search) from the vast library of
data available on World Wide Web.
Users can search for multiple things including queries,
documents, images, videos, webpages, and other content
on a search engine.
Search engines are build in such a way that they
effectively generate the required information by crawling
across the web and searching from the available
databases on internet.

16. History of Search Engines
 Archie was the first well developed search engine in the year 1990. It
used to search files by matching their names and indexing on FTP
server.
 In 1992 Veronica search engine was developed.
 Later in 1993 W3Catalog and Aliweb were formed which were web
search engines.
 WebCrawler search engine was the first to allow users search
keywords.
 Finally in 1994, the search engine Yahoo! was developed which gained
immense popularity.
 In 1998 when Google was founded as till now is the most used and
preferred browser all across the globe.

17. Architecture of Search Engine
Web crawlers – As the name suggests these acts as spiders
which crawl all over the web to collect required information.
These are special bots that search throughout the internet
and accumulates data using various links.
Database – It is a collection of data which is gathered by the
web crawlers after searching throughout the world wide web.
Search Interface – It provides a medium or interface for
users so that they can access and search on the database for
required information.

19. Working of a Search Engine
When a user searches for a particular data, the web crawlers
scan or crawl through the data available on web and gather all
the relevant information (Crawling).
Then, the gathered information is organized in the form of
catalog or database so that the relevant web pages can be
selected quickly.
The search engine then picks up the most relevant results
according to the ranking and finally displays it in the results
page or SERP.
It is quite a technical process, but all this happens so quickly
that user gets the results as soon as they search something
on the search engine.

20. Advantages of Search Engines
 Search engines have made it possible to navigate through the internet.
Even a person without any technical knowledge is able to use a search
engine for solving a query.
 The quick and efficient responses of search engine make it easier for a
user to immediately get result for their search.
 A search engine not only supports text results but also results like
images, videos, maps, documents and various other formats, hence
offering users a one stop solution.
 In today’s time people are using search engines not only for technical
purposes but also for researches, educational purposes and even in
day-to-day life.
 The user-friendly interface, organized results, customization features
and diversity of search results makes search engines one the most
essential tool for surfing on internet.

21. Examples of Popularly Used Search Engines
 Google – It is the most popularly and widely used search engine with
an attractive an user-friendly interface and a versatile library of
features which makes it first choice for maximum users when it comes
to search engines.
 Bing – Founded in 2009 by Microsoft, Bing is quite similar to other
search engines. It also allows users to search through images.
 Yahoo – It was among the earliest used search engines. However, its
popularity has declined over time. Earlier Yahoo offered a platform
called “Yahoo answers” where users could ask or answer various
questions.
 Baidu, DuckDuckGo and Yandex are some other popular emerging
browsers in today’s time.